Take 5 With Eric Dahlquist

Many hot rodders look at the 1960s as the glory days of hot rodding and racing before things got crazy with sponsors, money, and national coverage. As HOT ROD staffers, we’ve envied the magazine heroes that came before us. They got to drive the iconic muscle cars when they were brand new, witness racing before it became truly big time, and enjoy behind-the-scenes respect with the OE manufacturers that is much harder to attain today. The current staff often turns to those veterans for advice or just to wax nostalgic, and one of the most accessible is former HOT ROD Technical Editor and Motor Trend Editor Eric Dahlquist.

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Dahlquist grew up on a farm in Lockport, New York, and had mechanical stuff on his mind nearly from birth. He got a pilot’s license at 14 (dad had a plane) and began to dream about trekking to California to work for HOT ROD when he was still in grade school. While studying engineering at the University of Buffalo, he began writing about the East Coast drag racing scene—mostly for Cars magazine and the NHRA’s National Dragster—when the West Coast books all but ignored it. A letter to HRM publisher Ray Brock earned him a trip to meet Brock in Akron, Ohio, to do a story on Art Arfons’ barnstormer, and that eventually led to the cross-country road trip, an office at Petersen Publishing’s 5959 Hollywood Boulevard building, and a ’55 Mercury four-door for his daily driver. That was in June 1964, and his bosses were Publisher Brock and Editor Bob Greene (succeeded by Jim McFarland).

Dahlquist worked at HOT ROD until April 1968, when he moved to Motor Trend, eventually becoming the editor and developing even closer ties to the new-car manufacturers. The Motor Trend gig lasted until 1975 when he and HOT ROD Editor A.B. Shuman left to take on a small custom publishing project for Chevrolet. Dahlquist eventually bought out Shuman’s shares and the company became Vista Group, the West Coast representative for Pontiac, GMC, Oldsmobile, the GM Design Staff, and many more in the later years, including Mercedes-Benz. It’s where we magazine staffers went to get many of our test cars throughout the ’80s and ’90s. Today, Vista Group is mostly involved in vehicle placement for movies, television shows and commercials, and other advertising mediums. The Knight Rider Firebird? That was Dahlquist’s doing. So was Don Prudhomme’s Pepsi Challenger Firebird Funny Car in 1982. Any time you see a new Mercedes or other exotic in a big Hollywood movie, there’s a good chance that Dahlquist and Vista Group made it happen.

Because Dahlquist was so heavily involved in it, he was a natural to sit down with and ask about “the good old days” of the automotive and hot rodding worlds.

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HRM] Tell us a story from your early days at HOT ROD.

ED] In my first staff meeting at HOT ROD, they assigned me four stories and gave me less than 30 days to do them. Three of them were on things I knew very little about, and I questioned [HRM Publisher Ray Brock] about it. He said, “You know what Eric? This is a real tough world. It’s sink or swim, so which is it going to be?” I said I guess I’ll swim. They assigned me to [photographer Eric] Rickman and we basically lived together for four years, driving all over to the shops from San Francisco to San Diego. We met people, did stories…I was force-fed the job.

HRM] What was it like to work for Ray Brock?

ED] Over the years, we were great friends. There were some speed bumps, but right to the end, we were friends. Early on, he took me to Detroit and introduced me to people at Ford, GM, Chrysler, and AMC. He’d introduce you to guys your own age, mostly engineers, saying, “As they go up in their careers, you’ll go with them,” and that’s exactly what happened. It was the same with the races. We went to Daytona in 1965 and Ray said, “Now, this is going to be a test.” I was thinking he meant the story angle, but he didn’t make any arrangements for me. He left it up to me. I figured out the travel from the Petersen travel lady and got that. When I showed up at Daytona, Goodyear had just put up the Goodyear Tower, the place to be with VIPs, execs, food, and all that. Ray had passes to the suite, and I was following him and George Hurst up to the security checkpoint. The gal at the desk looked at me and asked him, “Is he with you?” Ray looked right at me and said, “I’ve never seen him before.” Then he turned to me and said, “This is another test. If you can find your way in here, legally and not on my coattails, you’ll move up a couple of notches.” He and George walked up and got a drink and left me standing there. The girl at the counter said, “Who was that mean son of a gun?” That’s my boss. So I walked back to the pits and started doing my job.

That night, I went to a party at the Daytona Plaza Hotel and this guy walked up to me and said, “Hey, you’re Eric Dahlquist. I’m so and so from Goodyear PR and I have something for you. I couldn’t get this to you before the race,” and he handed me my pass to the tower. I had done some circle-track stuff in HOT ROD, and he had read it. The pass had a number on it, and I asked him, “Just for curiosity, does Ray Brock have a higher or lower number?” He said, “He’s got a higher number, 135, I think.” That meant they made my pass before his. The next day at lunchtime, I started walking to the tower and Ray is in front of me, turns around and says, “Now Eric, I told you yesterday, we’re not going to bring you up here.” I said, “Ray, don’t worry about it. If I go to jail, you guys can either bail me out or not.” I deliberately waited while they went upstairs, then I went up. Ray’s at the bar with somebody and sees me, and says, “What are you doing up here? Did you sweet-talk your way past that girl? Because if you did, you’re going to have to leave.” By this time a few people had gathered, and I told him, “’I have just as much a right to be here as anyone, including you,” and I showed him my pass and made sure he and everyone else knew mine had a lower number. Everybody laughed. The point of this story is that Ray would never hold anyone’s hand. You had to figure out things on your own.

HRM] What are some memorable stories you did in HOT ROD?

ED] I did the first Street Hemi for HOT ROD, in 1966, I think [“Plenty Hot The Hemi,” Jan. 1966 issue]. I went to Detroit and got a prototype car, and Jack Watson and I went out street racing in it. We had four races. Four cars abreast, I mean, it was something. We shut everybody down, and the only thing that was even close was a 1963 Max Wedge 413 in a Satellite or something. We raced that guy like four or five times, and I don’t think he had ever been beaten. We pulled off in a parking lot, and he wanted to look at the engine right away.

I wrote two stories: One about the car, and the other about the phenomenon of street racing in Detroit. It was happening there, Cleveland, New York, Boston, Miami, here, everywhere, because anybody could go down to their Pontiac dealer or wherever and buy something, and with a few strokes of a pen be competitive. A lot of people were in the game. So I wrote about the phenomenon of street racing, and Ray said, “You can’t do that! Wally will kill us!” [Former HOT ROD Editorial Director and NHRA founder] Wally Parks wasn’t there anymore, but he still had a lot of influence. “But Ray, it’s happening all over America. We can get the story out and beat the other magazines to it.” He wouldn’t do it, and six months later Brock Yates did a story on it for Car & Driver, and everybody called it another breakthrough story.

HRM] When you witnessed the decline of the muscle car in the ’70s, did you realize that years later the ’60s were eventually going to be looked back at as “the golden era” of muscle cars?

ED] Not at the time. It didn’t seem like it would ever end. I got there at HOT ROD at just the perfect time, because the GTO had just come out, the 442, the 396 Chevelle, then the ponycars, the Mustang and the Camaro, and then all the rest of the stuff, the GS400 and all that. It was just baboom, baboom, baboom, and everything got better every year or half a year. Then, in December 1969, I think, at Motor Trend we ran a cover of the Ford with a “shotgun engine” [Boss 429] in it, the yellow Daytona car. The Superbird had just come out with the wing and the Hemi, and the Dodge Daytona 500. It just looked like these things were going to fly because every moment they were dropping down out of the sky like those dandelion parachutes it seemed like. And American Motors! The SC Rambler, what?! [laughs] It didn’t seem like it would ever end, and all of a sudden, it was gone, just about that quick, too. It was hit with the insurance, the emissions, the recession, the crash testing, all that stuff. In 1973-’74, it was all gone by then. And shortly afterward, you could buy any of these things for 500 bucks, which is what we all should have done, but you couldn’t give a Hemi away. It was a great time, though. Thank God I was there. It was just absolutely the best.

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HRM] Do you feel like it’s more expensive in relative terms than it was back then? Is a new car more expensive to today’s 20-year-old than it was to a 20-year-old in 1968?

ED] Oh yeah, no question. If you think about the Beach Boys song “409”: “I saved my nickels and I saved my dimes...” Those kids were working in a Ralphs market as box boys and had GTOs. Not many box boys today could afford one of today’s muscle cars. In 1971, I was living down the street from where I am now, within 1,200 feet, I guess. I was married, had four kids in private school, my wife didn’t work, we took vacations, and I did it on $1,200 a month. We put groceries on the table, paid the house payment, did the whole thing, and did it on $1,200 a month. Milk was 22 cents a quart or something, gas was 30 cents a gallon, my house payment was $234, and taxes weren’t much. This is in Sherman Oaks, south of Ventura Boulevard on Valley Vista Boulevard—OK, corner lot, nice place—and $234 a month. [Ed note: No current editor of HOT ROD could ever hope to afford what that area costs now.] The ability for people to earn in the middle class has been diminished since 1980. They’re still relatively earning what they did in 1970, and we’re in 2013.

HRM] What types of cars did you prefer to test? If you had a chance to drive a Street Hemi or a Ferrari Daytona, which would you choose?

ED] That’s another thing that the writers today [forget when] writing [about] this stuff…people couldn’t have cared less when the 427 Cobra came out. We had one in the garage, and nobody wanted to drive it. You ever drive a 427 Cobra? They’re hot. They’re pure horsepower, and they’re fun for a block or two, but after that…so nobody drove it. Even a Hemi, you had to change plugs just about every time you drove the things. They were race cars; they weren’t really pleasant to drive. So I liked driving Mercedes and BMWs, they’re nice cars.

My favorite new car of all time that I drove in testing was a 400 Ram Air Firebird in 1968. We did a story, and I think it was a cover headline. That was just the sweetest car. It was well balanced, everything worked, the shifter, everything just worked. Every once in a while a car comes along where everything is just perfect. All the tolerances line up, you know; it’s just the way it comes out. You know, a car built on Wednesday as opposed to a car built on Friday, that kind of thing. And that was one. Of course, a 1967 427 Corvette, that was a sweetheart of a car. We had a yellow and black one. It was a nice car to drive. It wasn’t brutal like a Cobra. A Cobra was just brutal, and that Sunbeam Tiger—I had to drive one of those to Carlsbad on a summer afternoon to test it, and by the time I got to Carlsbad my right leg was burnt to a crisp. The thing was hot, the ventilation was poor, the air roared over you. Nobody mentions that much today ’cause they’re worth so much. But that was not a nice car, and the Cobra would sit down there because it was too hot to drive.

HRM] What was the biggest turd?

ED] Hmmmm…I think the 1971 American Motors Matador. That was not good at all. It was white with blue stripes and it was parked down at the 8490 [Sunset Boulevard] building in the garage, and it sort of got lost for a year. Nobody drove the thing. It was really bad. It was like mush. Nothing seemed to work; the radio wasn’t any good. It stays in my mind.

HRM] Any other good muscle-car stories?

ED] The Cobra Jet Mustang was fun. I went back to the East Coast on a road trip for, I think, the Road Runner, and I had been talking to different engineers at Ford in its high-performance area about what it was doing. Ford kind of missed the muscle-car era in the beginning. The 390 Fairlane really wasn’t anything. Ford should have been right at the forefront, but it wasn’t. Bill Holbrook had a group that was putting cars together with truck parts, different blocks, and they worked pretty well, and he told me about a dealer in Rhode Island, Tasca. So I went to see Bob Tasca and his guys, some of whom I’m still in contact with, believe it or not. They showed me something called the King of the Road, and I did a story on their car for HOT ROD and showed the pieces that went into it. It went like the hammers and was great, and it turned out Ford had all these pieces in its parts bin but just hadn’t put together a car. So I did the story and talked about what went into the car and the philosophy. In the story, we put a ballot in the magazine and said, if you want a car like this, check this off and send it to Henry Ford II. We got 20,000 or so of the ballots, and I got a call from a Ford PR guy at the time who said Ford was going to build it. I said, “Can we do it first?” and he said yeah. So one day, out my window, the Ford hauler pulls up, and they had a Cobra Jet in the back, a white one. It was a bare-bones car, and it had no miles. It was freshly built, so I had to go out and put miles on it before we tested it, and Brock said, “Why don’t you drive to Fresno?” So I took it to Fresno over a weekend. And this was the new thing, but the Hemi was out, the Buick GS 400, which was much nicer to drive, a lot plushier. So I loaded some of the family in the car, I put enough miles to test the car, and we ran the test at Irwindale. It ran fine, not as good as it would have run if we spent some real time with it, but we got the first story.

HRM] At Vista Group, you developed a close relationship with Pontiac and racing. Tell us about it.

ED] We were doing Pontiac’s press cars, and in 1981 they had something called an image conference, and I was invited back to Ann Arbor with some other guys, including Pontiac Design Chief John Schinella and Bob Dorn the chief engineer, anyone who had something to do with Pontiac in a significant way.

This was when GM was not officially in racing, but everybody agreed that it should be, but that we couldn’t do it overtly. So he asked me if I could get some guys to run our cars—we’re talking Funny Cars. I went to Don Prudhomme and asked if he’d run a Pontiac Funny Car, some whole new deal based on the new ’82 Firebird. The chassis was up to him, but Pontiac wanted to do the body, and the aero, and at that time not a lot of people were doing anything with aero. Pontiac had just done all of these studies with the new Firebird in the wind tunnel and knew what the aero was. GM sent a clay modeler out, and Don modeled the car, a full-size clay model. The car got built, and Don was still back and forth on it. It was the Pepsi Challenger, the yellow one. We took it down to Orange County International Raceway and made a couple of passes. The first time they really got on it hard, the thing ran straight as a string, and Don was all smiles. He knew right away what was going to happen as soon as they started getting the thing cooking. It won all over the place, set the records, and that was all out of this image conference.

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You ever driven a 427 Cobra? They’re hot. They’re pure horsepower.

Cars We’ve Made

“Circle your choice in the box provided, and return to: Mr. Henry Ford II, Dearborn, Michigan, 48121.” That’s how the infamous 1967 HRM article by Eric Dahlquist began. In the three pages that followed, Dahlquist laid out Tasca Ford’s formula for a super-car Mustang. The resulting pressure from HRM readership persuaded Ford to offer the Cobra Jet Mustang for 1968.

Editors like Dahlquist deserve their fair share of credit for enticing the Motor City into building enthusiast cars. Here’s a quick list of vehicles writers have “forced” the OEMs into creating by showing what a few choice parts could do for new vehicle sales: